Vance: Courts trying to ‘literally overturn the will of the American people'

The Hill

23-05-2025

Vice President Vance waded into the power tug-a-war between the courts and executive branch in an interview published earlier this week, warning that the courts should pull back or risk stepping on the will of the American people.
In a conversation about immigration enforcement with the New York Times's 'Interesting Times' podcast, Vance said two principles core to the nation could slide into 'real conflict' unless district courts 'exercise a little bit more discretion' or the Supreme Court intervenes.
The first is that courts interpret the law, he said. The second is that the American people 'decide how they're governed.'
'That's the fundamental small-d democratic principle that's at the heart of the American project,' Vance said. 'I think that you are seeing, and I know this is inflammatory, but I think you are seeing an effort by the courts to quite literally overturn the will of the American people.'
Taking a step back, the vice president clarified that it's 'not most courts' contributing to the problem. But he questioned whether the Supreme Court understands its role in checking lower courts, in addition to the executive branch.
'I saw an interview with Chief Justice Roberts recently where he said the role of the court is to check the excesses of the executive,' Vance said. 'I thought that was a profoundly wrong sentiment. That's one-half of his job. The other half of his job is to check the excesses of his own branch.
'You cannot have a country where the American people keep on electing immigration enforcement and the courts tell the American people they're not allowed to have what they voted for,' he continued. 'That's where we are right now.'
Vance's remarks come as the White House and judiciary have been locked in a battle over the separation of powers. Trump's onslaught of executive actions have prompted hundreds of lawsuits, many which challenge his expansionist view of presidential power.
While his Justice Department has contended that the president possesses sole authority over the executive branch, with little recourse for the courts to check that power, dozens of judges from the district courts to the Supreme Court have stepped in.
Vance said that the administration would keep working President Trump's immigration agenda through the courts.
The ultimate goal, he said, is not to deport the 'gross majority' of noncitizens in the U.S., calling that a 'secondary metric of success.' Instead, he said he hopes to establish a 'set of rules and principles' that the courts affirm, so there is an infrastructure in place allowing the mass deportation of noncitizens.
'That, to me, is real success,' Vance said. 'But I think whether we're able to get there is a function, of course, of our efforts, but also the courts themselves.'
The vice president also touched on two of the administration's most controversial immigration moves: the use of the wartime Alien Enemies Act and Kilmar Abrego Garcia's mistaken deportation.
The Alien Enemies Act is a 1798 law that lets authorities summarily deport migrants amid an 'invasion' or 'predatory incursion' by a foreign nation. Vance said he believes that the wartime law is misinterpreted, that to have an invasion does not require '5 million uniformed combatants,' which he admitted are not present.
However, he suggested that thousands of noncitizens and their families 'very intentionally' came to the U.S. to cause or profit from violence, and the courts should trust the administration's assessment of the situation.
'I think that the courts need to be somewhat deferential,' Vance said. 'In fact, I think the design is that they should be extremely deferential to these questions of political judgment made by the people's elected president of the United States.'
Regarding Abrego Garcia's mistaken deportation to El Salvador, the vice president acknowledged courts' holdings that the administration made a mistake in deporting him and that the Supreme Court directed them to 'facilitate' Abrego Garcia's return. He said he 'sat in lunch' with El Salvador President Nayib Bukele to discuss the Maryland man's return, but Bukele didn't budge.
'Bukele basically said: I don't want to send this guy back. I think he's a bad guy. He's my citizen. He's in a prison in El Salvador, and I think that's where he belongs,' Vance said. 'And our attitude was: OK, what are we really going to do? Are we going to exert extraordinary diplomatic pressure to bring a guy back to the United States who's a citizen of a foreign country who we had a valid deportation order with?'